Troy’s Ironclad History by Don Rittner The city of Troy played a pivotal role in turning the Civil War in favor of the Union. Many of our factories produced material for the war effort. W. & L.E. Gurley made brass fuses for bombs; Corning, Winslow & Co. made steel rifled cannons; Eaton, Gilbert & Co. […]
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The Battle of Hampton Roads by Don Rittner During the Civil War, the Union began the building of 76 ironclad war ships, commissioning 42 of them before May 1, 1865. On the Confederate side, 59 ironclads were started, but only 24 were completed. Very few Civil War ironclads were sunk by gunfire. Instead, the Confederate […]
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An Ironclad Victory For Schenectady Clute Brothers Foundry Helped Turn the Civil War in Favor of the North By Don Rittner On March 9, 1862, the most famous naval battle in American history took place almost 600 miles from the Capital District. Yet, this 149-year-old event had Schenectady and Troy stamped all over it when […]
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The Eccentric Trojan By Don Rittner On the evening of Good Friday, April 14, 1865, actor and confederate sympathizer John Wilkes Booth assassinated President Lincoln with a single shot to the back of the head. Few know that the person who killed Booth for his deed was an eccentric former hat maker from Troy, Thomas […]
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Trojan Rose To The Occasion By Don Rittner I remember being amazed watching drone aircraft being flown over Afghanistan during the war against terrorism. Not only did they visually monitor the landscape for miles, but also delivered surprise payloads on unsuspecting terrorists. Fellow Troy lover Jim Shepard pointed out to me, not surprisingly, the advent […]
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A Misplaced “Rock” at Oakwood Cemetery By Don Rittner Buried at Oakwood Cemetery is the most successful Civil War commander on either side of the conflict, yet he’s rarely mentioned with the names of Grant or Lee, and not even listed in some modern American history textbooks. Ironically, George Henry “Pap” Thomas, Virginia-born, was so […]
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Underground Railroad Stopped Here by Don Rittner “This is a world of compensations; and he who would be no slave must consent to have no slave. Those who deny freedom to others deserve it not for themselves.” — Abraham Lincoln The Underground Railroad, a network of pro active people opposed to slavery prior to the […]
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Uncle Sam’s Uncle Tom by Don Rittner The book Uncle Tom’s Cabin has been often labeled as the kindling wood of the Civil War. Written in 1852 by Harriet Beecher Stowe, a child of a protestant preacher, it was originally penned as a set of articles for the Washington anti-slavery weekly, the National Era. The […]
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